


Change

by kentucka



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Character Study, Established Relationship, M/M, Mild Kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-07-23
Updated: 2007-07-23
Packaged: 2017-10-28 17:51:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/310525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kentucka/pseuds/kentucka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>And in this, he had started to trust them, just like they trusted him to have one of his brilliant ideas to save the day at literally the last second, which was a very frightening thought, relying on sudden flashes of insight; he also trusted them to watch his back, wielding knives and guns blazing, punching Genii lights out barefisted if they had to, making up for all the fighting skills he didn’t possess.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Change

**Author's Note:**

> This started out as a writing exercise, just to get me back into my writing groove, as well as to see if I could do SGA. Also, this is kind of self-indulgent (did I mention the light kink?). Here will be long, run-on sentences and going off on tangents; consider yourself warned. McKay seriously took over my brain. The fact that he did is the only reason this ever got posted.
> 
> Set after/spoilers for all of season 3.  
> Title alluding to a song by Deftones, Change in the House of Flies.

Trust.

Before this project, this job-- before this whole new _life_ in Atlantis, he hadn’t trusted anybody, except in the backwards way of always expecting people to fail him, to disappoint, to leave him fighting for himself. He didn’t know when it had started-- when it had started becoming an _issue_ rather than just the resignation of knowing that there wasn’t a soul on earth, maybe with the exceptions of Sam Carter and Jeanie, who was able to grasp the complexities of the problems he worked on, that his assistants would be late, that the handyman wouldn’t actually fix the leaking faucet if not under strict supervision and if left to his own devices in the small apartment, at least one bottle of beer would be missing from far back in the fridge, where the sneaky bastard thought it wouldn’t be quite so obvious that he was stealing from his customers. Yes, there was their father, the brilliant scientist who’d never made anything of himself, priorities quite different from Rodney’s own, like Jeanie, who chose husband and kid over adrenaline and pushing her own mental limits and changing the world -the universe- every day, chose ordinary over outstanding. He had never understood that, no matter how hard he’d tried to solve the equation, that a person wouldn’t like to do something great with their life, even if they never became famous for it, or were able to name a star or a plant or a newly discovered physical correlation they developed a formula for after themselves; if they could help understand their biggest enemies and find their weaknesses, allow Earth to advance more quickly by mastering Ancient technology, save any number of people by offering their genius to make that rescue plan work, to turn that weapon off, to make this ZPM last longer by raising the power efficiency of Atlantis, why wouldn’t they do so?

Rodney had always known what he wanted to do with the average of 80 years he had, not exactly, but in the vaguely specific quest for _achievement_ , of being proud of his work and making this world a better place. Quite soon it had turned out that he was destined to even higher honors, saving not just the world -Earth- but even the whole universe (with the regrettable loss of five sixths of an uninhabited solar system) from the Wraith, again and again. They hadn’t defeated the Wraith yet, but keeping them at bay for so long when even the Ancients had lost and abandoned ship (quite literally, since Atlantis was a space ship, after all), fleeing into higher spheres and leaving the ‘lesser’ human beings as casualties at war, fodder for the Wraith (yet another dire disillusionment, those Ancients and their morals)-- even if they hadn’t won yet he thought Earth already owed him a monument, were the whole Atlantis expedition not classified.

But every human being only defined itself by its society, its immediate surroundings: what was good, what bad, what to eat or to wear or what physical traits of a body were attractive. There was an African tribe piercing and stretching their lower lips as a status symbol, another where women used the red earth to clean and to protect their skin from the sun, and they were all so used to the sight of terracotta-colored people that it had become a sign of fertility and health; white or black skinned women would not find a man willing to marry them. Atlantis had its own standards in some regards as well, not only because of the tight mix of civil and military personnel, but because they were more than coworkers, more than ‘roommates’ trapped in the vastness of the lost city in another galaxy. Gradually, they had all become friends, despite their differences in fields of expertise, of preferred hobbies, and to Rodney, their opinions had started to matter much more than any reward or public recognition back on Earth, because that planet was far, far away, whatever fame he gained there couldn’t reach him, and it had never been about that anyways. He just did what he had come to do, and if the glint of pride in John’s eyes when he debriefed Elizabeth about the latest mission, or if Elizabeth accepted his recommendations without doubt, or if Ronon hugged him because for once, he’d saved the Neanderthal’s skin and not the other way around, if those small tokens of appreciation of his work thrilled him more than the PhDs on his office walls, Rodney told himself that it was only natural, as he was only human, and these people where his society now. His friends, an extended family.

And that wasn’t even the only way Atlantis had changed him. Near-death experiences hadn’t even been necessary, just the faint gloom of certainty that they would not be able to fend the Wraith off this time, a dark cloud on the horizon, but the wind already picking up and carrying the thunder of the storm coming with it, but the near-death experience had certainly driven the point home, that family was important. It was too easy to lose himself in figures and dependencies and his own genius, but they kept him grounded, showing him the way back to reality, the one he lived and sometimes forgot about, from where his brain had run off to the abstracts and equations that did not define reality, just described it in the only truly universal language of mathematics. Rodney loved them for it, that they were putting up with him, because he knew he’d never had lots of social skills, even if John was always persisting that his own lack in that department had made him join the air force, had made him seek out the emptiness of the skies, but everybody knew that John had a natural understanding of other people and was one of the most tolerant and open-minded men they all knew, absolutely inadequate for military, but perfect for this mission on Atlantis; all John had ever wanted to do was flying, which was what he’d done during wars and in Antarctica, and his weakness for guns had surely cinched the deal.  
The near-death-- hell, he’d actually been dead for a couple of seconds, although he’d been also just seconds away from ascending, and he still didn’t know how to feel about that, shocked, proud, worried, whatever, he’d told Heightmeyer to not ask about it anymore, he didn’t care what he felt about it, he hadn’t ascended and probably would never be in that state of mind again to get a chance at actually trying it, since for the life of him - ha, ha - he couldn’t sit through another meditating session with John or Teyla. But the whole ordeal had taught him that there was even more knowledge out there, that while he was a genius to his people he certainly wasn’t all-knowing, which was a humbling experience that had lasted all of three days, before his lab coats had reminded him just how much more stupid there was out there as well. And apart from all the simulations and efficiency boosters, another light had suddenly gone on in Rodney’s brain, which had had nothing to do with his work and more with the men and women he called friends, how much he could give them although he’d never considered himself capable of doing anything important that didn’t involve presents at a birthday, or saving their collective butts by putting that intelligence of his to good use. Family was important, he’d realized that months before, and these people had become his surrogate family in a galaxy where they were all orphans, he’d secretly known that even longer; suddenly he didn’t just believe that he had a place in this family as the mastermind, but also a purpose as somebody who could make them feel better, and he wanted that, wanted to give some back of how they made him feel good when they spent time with him, asked him out for lunch or congratulated every time on one of his projects in the endless line of projects, never taking his work for granted, and caring for the man who stood behind that work no matter how much he snarked and complained.  
They had all fought for him that much harder; the more he had accepted that he might not be around much longer, while he made his last rounds and made sure he’d done everything he could before-- made sure everybody knew how much they meant to him, the less willing they were to just let him go, even Zelenka who usually got the brunt of his foul mood. He wasn’t the only one who felt it, this connection they now shared, the protectiveness for each other - they hadn’t hesitated for a second to get Ronon back, an alien, the newest member of their team and still already fully integrated, just one of the many instances where that cohesion showed. Teyla had shared with him her conversation with John where he had expressed those emotions as well, that he’d be willing to do _anything_ for any of them, because they were basically all he had left to fight for, there was nobody back on Earth waiting for him, and while Rodney did, he had his sister and his niece, and yes, that Tofu-chicken guy, he felt just as strongly about this team, and every member of their expedition.

And in this, he had started to trust them, just like they trusted him to have one of his brilliant ideas to save the day at literally the last second, which was a _very_ frightening thought, relying on sudden flashes of insight; he also trusted them to watch his back, wielding knives and guns blazing, punching Genii lights out barefisted if they had to, making up for all the fighting skills he didn’t possess, no matter how often he secretly trained with Ronon, or went to the shooting range with John, who probably thought Rodney simply indulged his crazy weapons fetish, not once asking Rodney why, because they were friends after all, they could spend time together off duty; maybe John knew exactly why, on the other hand, but had the tact of not bringing it up. Still, he didn’t have Satedan strength, or the Athosian quickness and grace, or military weapons and tactical schooling, and although they all were a force to reckon with in their own way, together they were almost unbeatable, especially if they had Atlantis to send backup if they were simply outnumbered; hundreds of off-world missions, countless times throwing themselves headfirst into some kind of critical situation, had proven that.

And so, Rodney found himself, for the first time in his life, truly trusting, the I-place-my-life-in-your-hands kind; he’d been forced to do just that with almost any member of their team already, especially Beckett, and none of them had let him down yet. So it wasn’t that he _didn’t_ trust, the point was, though, that so far he’d always been forced to: knee-deep in water that leaked through the puddle jumper’s hull, his body dying as his mind tried to move on, trapped in a Wraith’s version of a freezer to store their food in, only it had been almost pleasantly warm. Trust, it had always been accompanied by the hard clench of fear around his chest, of taking chances and trying the impossible, because they had run out of the possible options; it had never felt good to trust, always the last hope he clung to, trust in his own abilities or the others’, whatever the situation required; he _did_ trust, he just didn’t _like_ it, there were always doubts in the back of his mind that they were out of luck this time, they wouldn’t make it out alive, something happening that lay outside their power to stop. Trust was something given out of desperation, forced on him, never something good, always connected to horrible events, pain and impending death.

“Rodney.” John’s voice was quiet, but he stood close enough that Rodney would have heard him if he’d no more than whispered.

Rodney rolled his shoulders, shaking off the queasy feeling all those memories had left behind, and looked up again, back safely in reality. “Sorry,” was all he offered after what had to be minutes of silence, minutes that John had patiently waited for an answer, and Rodney could see the worry in John’s eyes, could see that John had been reading him, if not his mind, and he’d been well on his way to spiral into dark thoughts that had no place here, not now, because here and now was about the positive side of trust, the one that had been earned and was given freely.

“Do you--” John started to repeat his question, but Rodney quickly cut him off.

“Yes, yes I do, I never wanted you to doubt that even for a second, because I really trust you.” Otherwise he’d be going crazy, fearing for his life constantly, and he probably would have died of a heart attack months ago. “But this is different.”

John nodded, but stayed quiet, and Rodney realized that this was his one chance, that John was giving him all the time he needed to think it through, but once he’d come to a decision, John wasn’t going to ever ask him again.

Different, the word resonated in his head, and suddenly he wondered, _how?_ Which trust weighed more, the one not to hurt you, or the one to save your life?  
And what was the harm in trying to experience this other side, the one where no one was in immediate danger?

Rodney inhaled deeply, raised his hands to put them on John’s chest. The scent of aftershave was faint this late in the evening, but Rodney followed it, his eyes falling shut as he swayed closer, and his nose ran along John’s neck.  
“Okay,” he breathed, and allowed John’s hands to wrap around his wrists.

**Author's Note:**

> This fic takes place in the same 'verse as [Filling Silence](http://archiveofourown.org/works/310530), which is a sort-of sequel, but both can be read as stand-alones.


End file.
